The following interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.

Let's start with some background. What would you like people to know about where you're from?
 Chris Alonso: Well, I'm from Phoenix, Arizona, originally — an ultra conservative state that seemingly moves farther and farther to the right every day. The Republican Party has had control of Arizona for quite some time. And since that time, the criminal justice system here has gotten worse and worse. Arizona is really most famous for Joe Arpaio and everything he did with the concentration camps known as Tent City. That's mainly what we're famous for out here as far as criminal justice.

Did you always have an interest in criminal justice?
Not always. I've always been aware that there was something very wrong with the judicial system [though]. When I was growing up, I knew a couple of lawyers that I kind of studied the law with, and I thought about getting into the profession myself at an early age, [but] I never ended up doing it.

Did you work with them?
I had a close associate who introduced me to a prominent attorney in Phoenix. And I got pretty close to the attorney, they took me under their wing, and taught me the ins and outs, and the reality of the justice system. Including when lawyers and prosecutors and judges and police are actually engaged in things that the public wouldn't be hip to. [I was] exposed to the reality of the system, of what the police and prosecutors and attorneys really do, that they don't want the public to know about.

Would you feel comfortable talking about your case? How did your own intimate involvement with the judicial system begin?
This particular case that I'm in here for right now, [happened when] I was very young. I was 20 years old when I was arrested and charged with this incident. And I didn't know it at the time, but Maricopa County was about to go through a state Capitol Case overload, and because of that, there weren't enough lawyers to cover all the cases.

What ended up happening was that by late 2005, there were over 150 people facing the death penalty in Maricopa County. And that's unheard of even compared to Harris County in Texas, which is the worst of the worst, back in the early '90s. These attorneys in Maricopa County were not able to handle the caseload that was pushed by the Maricopa County attorney Andrew Thomas. So everybody was facing the death penalty at the time. There were 150 of us who were pretty much stuck in a situation where, no matter what happened, we were going to have our rights violated in terms of due process, speedy trial, competent counsel, conflict-free counsel, etc.

When you say that you were destined to have your rights violated, what would you say the specific factors were that led to that situation?
That's a good question. The Capital Case Crisis that occurred in Maricopa County would not have been able to happen at all, if all parties were not 100% on board. The prosecutors, the judges, and all the lawyers had to participate in what I call, in my book, The Unconstitutional Silence.

What I mean by that is that you're in jail for a serious offense, and you cannot afford an attorney. The lawyer they provide you, as soon as they get on the case, they have to do certain things. These certain things were not done at all in the cases here. But when your attorney notices that the prosecutor is deviating from standard operating procedure, and they don't say anything, that's evidence of the Unconstitutional Silence. The same is true with the judge, and the prosecutor. The judges knew that certain things were supposed to be done at the initial stages, in terms of speedy trial rights, the discovery process, so on and so forth; and none of this was done.

The attorneys knew that they had to engage with the client on a daily basis in order to obtain information. And usually in a Death Penalty case —which is labeled a complex case— you have 18 months to go to trial if the client invokes speedy trial rights. I invoked my speedy trial rights, and I was in jail for almost six years. This happened to numerous people that I encountered within the jail.

So basically, by the beginning of 2007, there were over 200 people facing the death penalty. But there were only a couple of dozen Capital-qualified lawyers to take those cases. If the attorneys would have just simply decided not to accept appointments to any cases at all, then it would have forced the Maricopa County attorney's office into a situation where they would have had to drop the intent to seek the death penalty in all of the cases that did not warrant the death penalty. For example, there was one case that I can recall where it was a DUI and someone died. Instead of vehicular manslaughter, they charged capital murder.

Between 2005 and 2008, cases like that were popping up on the front page news all the time. So the question became, how many of these hundreds upon hundreds of death penalty cases are actually death penalty cases?

You mentioned that there might be more aspects where there were problems. Can you go into a little bit more detail about that? What is the discovery process, and how should it have gone?
Because of the overload, by the time the lawyer actually had the time to dedicate to the case, so much crucial time had passed. Time that there was no way to recoup. The same is true for detectives. [Think of] the TV show The First 48. Police Departments posit that the first 48 hours are crucial. The same can be said for the defense attorney. Everything that they do when they first obtain the case is crucial: Speaking to witnesses; trying to find out if the prosecutors evidence that they turned over thus far is true and correct; Was it obtained legally; so on and so forth. And there are several US Supreme Court cases that dictate what is supposed to happen as soon as the prosecutor's office files the notice of intent to seek the death penalty in a case. There's certain things that the defense attorney must do. None of these things were done during the Capital Case Crisis. None.

I talked to hundreds of people, including lawyers that I knew that were not involved, and asked them what the situation was. They advised that there was no possible way that these attorneys could provide competent counsel at that time. They were engaging in misconduct from day one by accepting appointment of the cases in the first place.

Knowing what you do now of the legal system, and the Capital Case Crisis, what would you do differently in your specific case?
That's a hard one to answer. I would say that, at the very beginning, I would have sought to represent myself, in order to invoke all of my rights as an individual citizen, as opposed to through an attorney. That was the ultimate mistake: Allowing the attorneys to represent me in the way that they did initially.

Do you think you would have been able to change the representation that they gave if you'd been able to advocate for yourself more? Or do you think it was a flaw in the system?
That's an important question, and I speak about this in my articles, as well as in my book. Most people approach the criminal justice system in the United States in such a way that they think that it might be broken. This or that happened because the system is broken, we need reform and things like that. That's completely incorrect. 

The Capital Case Crisis would not have been able to occur at all, had the criminal justice system in the United States not been set up, and specifically designed, the way that it is. It's not broken. It operates exactly the way that it was designed to do. The treachery comes from the Arizona Republican Party. The judges, the prosecutors and the attorneys — 99% of them are part of the Republican Party in Arizona. So they act as pioneers of this kind of neofascism that we're seeing in the United States right now. I call them the pioneers of it is because they've implemented policies, and a culture, in Maricopa County [specifically], in which the Unconstitutional Silence has been able to prevail.

In other words, the Maricopa County Attorney's Office is not the only one that's culpable here; the State Bar of Arizona, and the Maricopa County Superior Court are deeply involved. And the only way that something like this could occur, is if all of them knew exactly what was going to happen, and how it was going to happen, and ultimately, how it was going to end.

[To go] back to the question of what I would have done differently: the agents that they gave me —known as these attorneys— I would have invoked my right to represent myself and make sure that I got, at the very least, the due process and speedy trial rights. Other than that, it's extremely difficult to explain without getting very legal and technical into it.

How would you define the Capital Case crisis in Maricopa County? What is it? Can you break it down?
We need to just call it what it is: a crime against humanity. I would call it genocidal fascism, I would call it ethnic cleansing. And the reason why I use these strong terms is because I'm not the only one that's written articles about the Capital Case Crisis.

Since the beginning of 2005, there have been numerous articles written by local journalists and Civil Rights attorneys regarding the Capital Case Crisis. One of the most important of these is the Case Study Report published by Harvard University, (Too Broken To Fix). This is the most important one, although it's not altogether completely accurate. It's the most important because it actually points at what they refer to as the overzealousness of the prosecutors, and the incompetence of the defense lawyers. But to everyday citizens who get their information about the criminal justice system from shows like Law & Order, and to those who wrote the Harvard case study, they have approached the system in a way [that's incorrect]. 

Thinking that the defense attorneys, maybe they're just dumb, or maybe the prosecutors are just overworked, and the judges really do have good intentions — that's not the case. These people are not stupid. They're actually very intelligent. And they're just as intelligent as they are diabolical. They knew exactly what they were doing.

The most significant point that I can put forth on the Harvard Case Study is that out of the hundreds of people who are facing the death penalty, during this time —and the Case Study is only from 2005 to around 2010— I would argue that the Capital Case Crisis went as far as 2005 to 2018, even the beginning of 2019. What they say is that 57% of the people who are facing the death penalty during this time were people of color, mostly Hispanic. And I think that's a very significant point. When you take a bird's eye view of the entire situation, I think that that single point right there is extremely important in terms of [the] intentions of these people.

Would you say the primary inaccuracy of the Harvard Case Study is the intent that is ascribed to the players?
Yes. The main attorneys involved — attorneys like Treasure VanDreumel or Herman Alcantar, or Randall Craig. These attorneys are veterans. They have done many Capital Cases before. They were well aware of what was going to happen once Andrew Thomas flooded the system with death notices. There's no law in Arizona, or in the United States, that says that Capital Case lawyers have to accept appointments. They don't have to. The courts have said in the past that an attorney trying to serve their client cannot take more than three Capital Cases at a time and that's pushing it. [But] these lawyers had up to 12 — which is not only against a citizens rights, but I would say that it is actually against the law. No lawyer can serve the client competently with that many Capital Cases at a time.

This goes back to the speedy trial rights and all of the things that are supposed to happen initially, when they first get an appointment to the case. A year or two could go by without the lawyer even engaging in the six Capital Cases that she accepted appointment to, let alone visiting the client and trying to help in any meaningful way.

This single issue violates the fundamental principles of constitutional law. In other words, your attorney can't be the one that's violating all of your rights, and you still have a fair trial. If they obtain a conviction in such a situation, the individual is not detained legally. He's not convicted legally. But everything about the Capital Case Crisis itself undermines the validity of the convictions involved.

Do you know how many cases your lawyer had at the time of your own Capital Case?
I was in jail with those attorneys representing me for five years. So when the first attorney accepted appointment to my case, I believe she had six or seven ongoing Capital Cases. But that's just the Capital Cases that were awaiting trial. She had over 70 other appeals and petitions for post-conviction relief. And she was a solo practitioner.

When you're facing the death penalty in the United States, it's mandatory to have multiple attorneys. They give you two, and a mitigation specialist, as well as a private investigator. But the same problems involved with the attorneys that we've covered so far, are the same problems with the other two professionals. They are contracted through the county. They also had too many Capital Cases to function competently for their clients.

What would you say are the key factors that contributed to the Capital Case Crisis in Maricopa County?
Between the judges, the defense lawyers and the prosecutors, I would say that everything centers around intent. In every sphere of the law, including international Human Rights law, when discussing any type of — I'll just say genocide or ethnic cleansing — the key factor is intent. And, in this specific case, in the Capital Case Crisis, the intent cannot be misconstrued. It's blatant, it's in your face, and it's obvious. I say this because any competent lawyer, investigator or journalist who really looks at the facts, who's not deluded by what the criminal justice system is, how it functions, how it operates, etc. — it's just too obvious to disregard and say that it was just overzealous prosecutors, or incompetent or overworked attorneys, or judges who had too much on their plate. These explanations don't suffice for this type of atrocity.

You wrote a book about this, titled True Believers: The Arizona Republican Party's Cult of Genocidal Fascism and the Need For An Actual Revolution — why did you choose this title?
In writing about the Capital Case Crisis, I knew that prisoners who write about these topics can easily be dismissed as sour grapes. I don't believe that anyone who was involved in the Capital Case Crisis —the clients, the defendants— were never heard in courts, or even when they were interviewed by journalists. I don't believe anybody was taken seriously. So I knew that I had to take the Capital Case Crisis and put it into the larger picture. What Maricopa County is in terms of the justice system and how it functions. But Maricopa County isn't the only place. It's the worst, but it's not the only place where these types of things happen. So I [didn’t limit] the scope of the book to just Arizona. I knew that I had to broaden it to the criminal justice system in the United States, the myths of what it is, how it was created, and why it functions the way that it does.

And so the book is about not only the Capital Case Crisis, it's about how the Republican fascist tradition is directly responsible for numerous atrocities involving the criminal justice system, including mass incarceration, racism, and corruption, and how this continues to reverberate in connection to the US empires' response to the merging of the Black Liberation Movement, and Revolutionary Communism.

I believe that most authors writing about these topics in he past, as well as in recent years, have missed the significance of not only the fact that the early alliance between the Black Liberation movement and the Communist Party is woven into the fabric of the history of the justice system itself, but also that the explanation of how the system came to include mass incarceration and militarized policing is not complete without discussing how this alliance formed the basis for the creation of the Black Panther Party.

The merging of a portion of Black activists joining the Communist Party formed the very basis for the founding of the Black Panther Party. In 2020, I'm sure everyone has noticed, the Anti-Fascist movement and Black Liberation Movement have merged again, out of necessity. And I believe that the ethnic cleansing and attempted genocide [that's happening through] the Capital Case Crisis is a significant issue to factor into the social justice movement.

Even if [the book] doesn't obtain any justice for myself, I wrote the book for the younger generation of Anti-Fascist activists. To illustrate how history will always repeat itself absent direct action for a participatory democracy; and how important it is to learn the lessons from revolutionary movements of the past. I think that's very important and key.

In part one of the book I give a detailed explanation of what I refer to as The Contagion. The Contagion of white supremacy, and how it was invented to break working class solidarity. An in-depth look at the ways that anti-capitalist, anti-racist movements organized historically: their strengths, the weaknesses, and the environments that created them.

This is important [to understand how] the Capital Case Crisis was able to happen in the first place, because of the culture of the Republican Party and Maricopa County. The successes and failures in achieving radical change in the past with respect to those movements. And I believe that it was out of this fascist tradition that the US government — and specifically the Republican Party — became emboldened. [They are in] a methodical war against the poor, women, and the Black and Brown communities.

The book is broken up into three parts, and in part two, I focused exclusively on the Arizona Republican Party and the Capital Case Crisis. What they did and how it happened. How a relatively small group of judges, prosecutors, and defense attorneys committed the biggest fraud in US history by using the criminal justice system. And ultimately, achieved their desired goals of mass incarceration, and what I coined as Judicial Genocide of minority communities in Maricopa County on an unprecedented scale.

During the crisis, between 2005 and 2018, there were hundreds of people facing the death penalty that shouldn't have been in the first place. And I think when you review the articles by the journalists, and case studies, such as the Harvard report, I think they all missed the point. And that's another reason why I wrote the book.

Can you talk a little bit more about the process of writing the book? How did you conduct the research? Who/what were your sources? How did you reach the conclusions that you reached?
 A lot of it was just researching and studying the history of these movements and the environments in which some of these movements occurred. As far as the Capital Case Crisis, I was able to reach out to several attorneys who were prosecutors [at the time] and became defense lawyers because of what they encountered. They couldn't take being a prosecutor anymore, because of what these people did. One could say that their consciences got to them. I was able to discuss the ins and outs of the Capital Case Crisis and obtain a significant amount of information from them. Other than that, I've probably read 95% of all articles and case studies and petitions that have come out regarding the Capital Case Crisis itself.

Why should people know about the Capital Case Crisis? Why is it important that people understand what's happened?
It's a very crucial time in this country right now. There's never been a time — since the 1960s and early 1970s — when there was such an uprising, such turmoil, in the justice system, and in the political system. Now is a time when, if people [know] more about the Capital Case Crisis — what it is and the truth about it — if this issue were brought to the forefront of the conversation, more could be done from the Social Justice Movement as a whole. Civil Rights attorneys and Human Rights attorneys are involved in the movement. I believe that the Capital Case Crisis is of great importance to the bigger picture of the Social Justice Movement, not just in Arizona, but in the United States as a whole.

In researching the book, did you come across any stories or facts that surprised you?
Because of my experience with the system and my knowledge of the law, and now the system itself, I have to say that no, nothing surprised me at all. It's been almost 20 years now that I've been studying the law, and I've been incarcerated for almost 20 years. Once the final year came around of my time in the jail waiting [for] the trial itself, nothing surprised me anymore. I knew exactly what to expect, and exactly what to do.

I would also like to point out that of all the articles that have been written about the Capital Case Crisis, several of them actually focus on my attorney, Treasure VanDreumel, because for one case she was paid a million dollars. That was the Martinson case. ...The reason why I say in the book that it was a fraud on the taxpayers as well, is because the attorneys misrepresented that they were going to provide a meaningful adversarial testing process for the clients' cases. And that was the premise of their contract with the county. But because that's not what happened, they obtained the taxpayer money fraudulently. And the Office of Public Defender Services was directly involved. [There are] numerous specific stories in the book regarding the intricate details of how the fraud was committed.

How can the victims of the Capital Case crisis get justice?
This is where it becomes tricky, and this is another reason why I wrote the book. Because Human Rights attorneys and Civil Rights attorneys — 90% or more function to uphold the criminal justice system as is. They don't actually seek transformation of the system. And I think that's key, because most of Civil Rights and Human Rights lawyers are part of organizations that promote themselves as saviors of Human Rights; as Civil Rights warriors. But that is completely false. And that's significant when it comes to contacting groups and individuals who the prisoner is actually going to confide in, and relate to.

To actually find an organization or an attorney who's going to fight to do what's necessary in court is next to impossible. However, I have found some organizations and groups of attorneys who specifically state that their mission, and their vision, is to [go beyond achieving] action on reform, but actual transformation, radical transformation of the criminal justice system itself.

What steps would you take to ensure that there is never another Capital Case Crisis?
Unfortunately, there's nothing that can be done outside of what certain networks of attorneys, and activists, are doing now. There's a growing narrative from the American Republican Party that paints Social Justice activists in an extremely negative light. It's nothing new, but it's been intensified in recent years. The Republican Party, as a whole, represents neofascism in America. And what's going on as far as the political climate in Arizona right now is a major contributing factor to these issues. 

The radicalization of the Arizona Republican Party, specifically, is more intense than all of the other states combined. The last three decades of the culture that have been injected into Arizona as a whole. So the radicalization from the Trump years, for example, has really hit home in Arizona because of these white power militias, like the Proud Boys and the Oathkeepers. Arizona —and Maricopa County specifically— is a stronghold of these groups.

A cursory review of recent articles regarding Oathkeepers, for example, shows that Oathkeepers are members of the police in Arizona, they have taken over the sheriff's offices, and are running for [political] office. Things like this. And keep up on what's going on with the January 6 committee. [Average] citizens should find this a little terrifying.

You mentioned several groups you support that are fighting for transformation of the judicial system. Can you go into more detail about the groups you support and what led you to support them?
I dedicate my book to a few activists who I really respect: Sunsara Taylor, Shanta Driver, Natasha Lennard, Nomiki Konst. They are all doing something that really counts.

I would say that the savvy activist will treat Human Rights lawyers and Civil Rights lawyers with skepticism, disdain, or even contempt, because of how they engage the system and the way that it plays right into the falseness of — and the illegitimacy of — the system itself. In other words, they play the game, knowing that nothing will ultimately be done. They are agents of the US government, rather than activists as they claim to be.

So in terms of the groups and activists that I support and the specific women [I dedicated my book to]: I view these brave women as my revolutionary sisters. Sunsara Taylor is a spokesperson for the Revolutionary Communist Party. She advocates for global communist revolution, grounded in the teachings of the chairman of the party, Bob Avakian, whose work has a significantly advanced communist theory. Sunsara Taylor is an advocate for this framework that will, I believe, ultimately lead to human emancipation. She's out there constantly protesting and standing up to American fascism. She fights for women's rights, which is something that I enthusiastically support. She's a great inspiration to me.

As a writer and as an activist, Shanta Driver is a Civil Rights lawyer and activist. She is the national chair of an organization called By Any Means Necessary (BAMN), which is another group that I support. She's argued cases in the US Supreme Court. As an attorney, she has taken the fight into the courtrooms for radical change, racial equality, immigrants rights, and she has a long, well documented history of fighting for Human Rights.

Nomiki Konst is a progressive activist and media personality. I'd say she's best known for being a national surrogate for Bernie Sanders. She is a very outspoken advocate for the objectives of the progressive movement as a whole. She debates these issues frequently, on, of all places, Fox News, where she holds her ground pretty well.

Natasha Lennard is a writer, journalist and activist. Her book, Being Numerous: Essays on Non-Fascist Life, was a great inspiration to me, and I quote her in my own book.

Each of these women have inspired my work, and I owe them a great debt. I believe in the groups that some of them are associated with: the Revolutionary Communist Party, Democratic Socialists of America, By Any Means Necessary, and others. In terms of the political climate in the United States right now, we can no longer wait. My book is a warning that if we don't check this fascist movement, now, the model for the Capital Case Crisis in Maricopa County will become the new normal.

I strongly believe this. These far right politicians and activists have aligned themselves with the global influence of certain dictators like the Hungarian dictator, Viktor Orbán. And these people truly believe in the conspiracy theory known as the Great Replacement. I point out in my book significantly that the Arizona Republican Party pioneered the Republican Party's response to the Great Replacement conspiracy theory.

It is crucial to teach the younger generation of Anti-Fascist activists. What the key features of structural white supremacy are, the key features of insurgent white power groups, and how they are in collusion with politicians. The younger generation should be able to articulate why it's vital to fight such groups.And also learn the lessons, the failures of militants, and of liberatory movements of the past. Our work is important to the struggle for — and transformation of — the criminal justice system as a whole, and for a non-racist, class-free society. I also support the Pacific North West Youth Liberation Front, Refuse Fascism, Rose City Antifa, NYC Antifa, and Black Lives Matter.

If there were one change you could make to the system right now, what would it be?
I wish there was a magic wand that could be waved at this situation. But the reason why I have engaged myself with, and support, these movements, organizations, and individuals, is because I've studied the system for more than 25 years. I've studied the law, including international Human Rights laws, and Civil Rights law, for many, many years, I've [continually help] prisoners with their legal cases, free of charge. I engage in this work to be as supportive as I can, of the movement as a whole.

I know for sure that we cannot achieve any type of change, divided. And it is one of the things that Bob Avakian points out specifically: absent radical change, there can be no change. The movement now has come to include activists of all walks of life. And it's beyond any limitations of gender or race or creed. But in factions, we will not win, only united. We can achieve the actual emancipation of humanity as a whole.

And I think that my contribution to this movement can be my work against a future Capital Case Crisis, by exposing the intricate web of individuals responsible. [Exposing] not only what they do, but how they do it and, most importantly, to articulate why they do this. This is where the most of the general public are not going to be able to understand it. Not for lack of intelligence, but because of how deep and profound this type of hatred really is toward people of color, toward minorities, toward women. And I think that it's time for everybody to, frankly, wake the fuck up to exactly what is transpiring here, and how crucial the next couple of years are to the system as a whole.

I've spoken a lot about the Republican fascists, but I haven't spoken about the Democratic fascists. The best thing that can happen to the Democratic Party right now, is for it to be purged of capitalists. Going back to all of these organizations that I support — the National Lawyers Guild, the Alliance for Global Justice, the Center for Constitutional Rights — these groups, and the individuals associated with them, are engaged in an anti-capitalist fight. Going back to the very root cause of the oppression itself, and the multiple interlocking systems of oppression that occur in this country, the root cause is capitalism.

I believe that what they call an ideology in the far left is not an ideology at all. Communism is a philosophy, because it is a constant revolution: a revolutionary search for truth. The very word ideology, is not [the right word to use] to speak of this movement. What I termed the Collective Subjective Universe of these Republican neofascists is something that has been forced on society as a whole. And I believe that it's very important to actually see what's going on, through the jungle of political, economic and legal trickery.

Not until you've experienced the system, can you really be aware of what the system is all about and how it is occurring. Those who have been termed the extreme far left, or ultra left — myself included— are the people who I view as awakened, not the ones who are going to continue to lie down and be oppressed. But the fight for all people, and the revolutionary framework that Avakian has set forth, is to break all of the chains: the chains that bind women, the chains that bind people of color, that [have created ghettos, led to us] harming each other and the drug trade and all of this nonsense, it has all played out.

Only united can we [change] this system. And going back to the original question, I would say that the single best thing that everybody can do, is to communicate, don't be deluded, and help each other. [See how the struggles] lead to the root causes of oppression as a whole.

What does justice mean to you?
Freedom. It means freedom. Freedom for all people. Freedom from the culture of Americanism, freedom from the culture of patriarchy, and imperialism. Freedom from the very culture that oppresses women, and people of color.

In my book I detail a formula that I use, called Awaken, See and Act. Awaken assumes that you've fallen asleep, that you don't really know what is going on. Politicians and police really are not interested in your wellbeing. See, is to go out and see the world as it is, not the collective subjective universe of the fascists, but actually see objective reality, or make an effort to see objective reality the way that it is. And then Act in your quest for sovereignty and social justice.

It's easier to give up and say that nothing can be done, but the brave women that I've dedicated my book to — [through] their writings, [help us] understand that there are so many engaged in the fights right now. [Seeing that] we're making progress is what keeps me engaged. It brings meaning to my life. And as a revolutionary communist, as a teacher, as a writer, it is my duty to present my loyalty to the movement as a whole, and to support all that are involved, not just the ones who are strong enough to stand up and fight, but also all of the ones who are weaker than we are. Not everyone can be a revolutionary. We do it for the ones who cannot do it for themselves.

What can people do to help?

I would say reach out, I would say reach out to any of these organizations. Read the website and get engaged, volunteer, see how you can help. Take the struggle that's most important to you, and develop a plan to act in solidarity, and solidarity with these movements, and with these groups. I'd say that that's the best way to engage.